In less than five months, Jersey City voters will head to the polls for the city?s quadrennial city election, when the mayoralty and all nine City Council seats are up for grabs.

Whatever the results, there are certain to be changes on the council, where one current member is running for mayor and as many as three sitting members are possibly taking a pass on seeking re-election.

The marquee race is for mayor, with longtime political nemeses Mayor Jerramiah Healy and Ward E Councilman Steve Fulop are going head-to-head for the chance to govern the state?s second-largest city.

Healy, a former municipal judge and councilman, is hoping for a third full term. Voters first tapped him for mayor in a special November 2004 election after Glenn Cunningham?s death, and he won election the following May to his first full term. He won again handily in 2009.

Fulop first won election to the council in 2005 ? defeating a Healy man who has since endorsed Fulop ? and was re-elected in a 2009 landslide. Fulop, a U.S. Marine and former Goldman Sachs trader, is making his first bid to be the city?s top executive.

Fulop, who has been planning his bid for the mayoralty for years, raised nearly $800,000 as of October. Healy, who only announced his re-election intentions in February, raised just under $300,000, though his campaign claims it has boosted its fundraising since then.

After a sleepy summer, the Healy/Fulop contest has shifted into gear this fall, with Healy nabbing endorsements of the Jersey City teachers union and Hudson County Freeholder Eliu Rivera. Fulop, meanwhile, won the nods of a group of African-American pastors, some high-profile Latino leaders and Freeholder Bill O?Dea.

Rumors abound about other boldface names jumping into the fray, including state Sen. Sandra B. Cunningham, but time is running out for a top name to enter the race and compete financially with Fulop.

Jersey City mayor?s races aren?t cheap. In 2009, Healy spent over $3 million to win, while his nearest competitor, former assemblyman Lou Manzo, raised about $300,000 for his entire team. Healy won by nearly 30 points.



CITY COUNCIL

The City Council has three at-large council reps. Two of them, Peter Brennan and Rolando Lavarro, have announced that they will seek re-election, Brennan to his fourth term and Lavarro to his first full term.

The other, Viola Richardson, said she has made no decision yet on 2013.

Lavarro joined the council just last November after winning in a wild special election that saw 17 candidates running for two spots. He is running on Fulop?s team, Brennan on Healy?s.

Omar Perez, a former Healy aide, announced this month that he plans on running for an at-large seat on Healy?s ticket. Perez ran in last year?s special election, and came in ninth out of the 17 candidates.

In Ward A, former schools superintendent Charles T. Epps Jr. has declared his intentions to run. A former assemblyman, this would be his first bid for council. He'll face Frank Gajewski, a former police chief, who is running on Fulop?s slate.

Current Ward A Councilman Michael Sottolano is not seeking a third term.

In Ward B, David Donnelly, the ward?s current representative on the council, announced in early January that he planned not to seek re-election. Donnelly joined the council as a mayoral appointment in 2009, and then won a special election in 2010 to remain in the seat until Jun 2013.

Ward B activist Esther Wintner, who ran in the 2010 special election and lost to Donnelly, has signaled her intention to run. Formerly a harsh administration critic, Wintner has lately tossed most of her barbs at Fulop instead, leading to rumors that she may join the Healy slate.

Ward C Councilwoman Nidia Lopez has not announced whether she will seek re-election to her second term. Another Healy loyalist who has since become a Fulop ally, Lopez told The Jersey Journal last week she has yet to make a decision, and then launched into a full-throated endorsement of Fulop?s mayoral bid.

JP Morgan analyst Janet Chevres is running on Healy's ticket in Ward C, which Healy supporters have vowed to "take back" from Lopez.

In Ward D, newsstand owner Michael Yun, who heads the Central Avenue Special Improvement District, has said he?ll run to replace current Ward D Councilman Bill Gaughan, who has made no official announcement about his future. Gaughan has been Ward D?s council rep for nearly two decades.

The Healy camp had hoped Assemblyman Sean Connors would run to succeed Gaughan, but Connors, who endorsed Healy in August, retracted his endorsement last month in a move that stunned and angered Healy loyalists and even some in Connors? camp, and then joined Fulop's slate as its Ward D candidate.

Ward E ? Fulop?s base ? finds community activist Dan Levin running on Healy?s ticket, much to the surprise of some of his supporters. Levin, who called on Healy to resign after the massive 2009 corruption sweep, ran for mayor in 2009, coming in fourth, and for an at-large council seat last year, coming in seventh.

Fulop, meanwhile, has tapped activist Candice Osborne to run for his current seat.






Jersey City Ward F City Councilwoman Diane Coleman has not yet announced her intentions for 2013, but she's a sure bet to run for the Ward F seat she won in last month's special election.JJ


There are no official candidates for the Ward F council seat, though it?s likely that current Ward F Councilwoman Diane Coleman will run for re-election. Coleman won last month in a special election for a term that ends in June. She defeated Michele Massey, who was appointed to the seat last December when Richardson became a councilwoman at large.

Coleman said she may come to a decision after the holidays on whether she'll run.

Massey told The Jersey Journal after her election defeat that she may run again, and she was seen just last week with members of the administration at a Ward F event touting new crime-fighting initiatives.

Meanwhile, former Jersey City cop Rich Boggiano has announced a bid without saying where he intends to run. Boggiano, who made a strong in last year?s at-large special election, said he may run in Ward C or for at-large. Boggiano, head of Journal Square?s Hilltop Neighborhood Association, is unaffiliated with a ticket.

Another possible candidate who may be familiar to voters is Imtiaz Syed, who came in eighth out of 17 candidates in last November?s special at-large council election. He has filed campaign documents indicated a 2013 run.

The city election is set for May 14, 2013. A runoff will be held June 11 for any race in which no candidate receives over 50 percent of the vote.

Candidates interesting in running need to hand in petitions by 4 p.m. on Monday, March 11, 2013. Mayoral and at-large council candidates needs valid signatures of 1,331 registered Jersey City voters ? one percent of the total number of registered voters in the November 2012 General Election ? while Ward A candidates need to hand in 248 valid signatures of registered voters; Ward B candidates, 202; Ward C, 195; Ward D, 189; Ward E, 237; and Ward F, 261.

The City Clerk's office said officials there won't be ready for another week or so to hand out information packets to would-be candidates.